


and i'll be looking at the moon

by wildcard_47



Category: Mad Men
Genre: F/M, Light Dom/sub, Mild Kink, Sorry Not Sorry, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-22
Updated: 2015-08-22
Packaged: 2018-04-16 17:09:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4633380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wildcard_47/pseuds/wildcard_47
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ginsberg walked back to the booth as slowly as he could make himself go, but wasn’t able to avoid the little shiver of fear that crept up his spine when Rachel Katz turned to stare at him, her blue eyes flicking to his in an unnerving way, asking a silent question. <i>Where the hell are they?</i></p><p>“Okay," he blurted out. "I got no idea where Pete is. But Don’s not coming."</p>
            </blockquote>





	and i'll be looking at the moon

**Author's Note:**

  * For [adreadfulidea](https://archiveofourown.org/users/adreadfulidea/gifts).



“Don’s not there? Are you fucking kidding me?” Ginsberg leaned his forehead against the cool glass of the telephone booth, sweating in his plaid suit jacket and loose brown trousers, desperately trying to ignore the stares of the people in the hallway around him. What the hell was he supposed to do at a place like this, alone with a client? They’d been waiting on everybody else for thirty minutes already. The waiters kept giving him dirty looks.

At least Caroline didn’t call him on the swearing. “Honey, I don’t know what to tell you. He’s been gone two hours, and nobody answered the house phone. You want me to call Roger?”

“No,” Ginsberg snapped, squeezing his eyes closed. “She fucking hates Roger. Pete told me. Don’t—don’t do that.”

He didn’t know why the hell Pete was so late—Stan used to joke that the only way Pete would miss a client dinner was if he dropped dead in the cab on the way over, and maybe not even then—but Draper not showing up really took the fucking cake. That, Ginsberg was sure, had to be on purpose. What an asshole.

He wished Stan had picked up the phone. Except Stan would probably have just laughed at him, instead of helping him. So no, maybe it was a good thing Caroline picked up Don’s extension. She probably had to deal with shit like this all the time, working for Roger.

“Well, I think you got two options.” The secretary sounded weary, like she had pretty much given some version of this speech before. “You can go back in there, make an excuse, and tell Mrs. Katz you’ll have to reschedule, or you can go in, wait for Pete, and give the presentation by yourself. ”

“Jesus,” Ginsberg let out a breath. “How am I even—if I stay to give the thing, who the hell’s gonna pay? This place costs a fortune.”

There was no way he was gonna be able to scrape up enough cash out of pocket to afford a place like this, even with the money he was making now. But he couldn’t let the client pay—especially one like Rachel Katz. Pete would flip his shit, and then Joan would flip hers, and then they’d all be miserable.

“Oh, I’ll send you money. There’s messengers still going.” He could hear her thumbing through papers in the background, or maybe her Rolodex. “You’re at La Grenouille, aren’t you?”

He couldn’t help pointing out the gaping flaw in this half-baked plan. “Yeah, but how’re you gonna get that kind of cash at seven o’clock at night?”

“Don’t worry about it,” she replied with a laugh—and okay, he did not expect her to sound that confident. Maybe she was taking it from petty cash, or maybe she had some discretionary thing of her own, for Roger. That sounded reasonable. He was always throwing money around—it couldn’t all be his, could it?

A man in a suit tapped on the outside of the glass, making Ginsberg jump.

“Yeah, all right already!” He lowered his voice. “Shit. Sorry. I gotta run.”

“Call me if anything changes. I’m here for another twenty minutes.”

“Okay. Goodbye.”

He walked back to the booth as slowly as he could make himself go, but wasn’t able to avoid the little shiver of fear that crept up his spine when Rachel Katz turned to stare at him, her blue eyes flicking to his in an unnerving way, asking a silent question. _Where the hell are they?_

“Okay. I got no idea where Pete is. But Don’s not coming,” he blurted out, and then bit his tongue against the cuss words that threatened to follow this sentence.

She lifted an eyebrow, her jaw tensing in a way that made him think she was furious. “Really.”

“Jesus. I’m sorry.” He was desperate to keep her here, at least for a drink, so he could wait around for the money Caroline was sending over. And, yeah, also so he wouldn’t look like a total failure. “He’s such an asshole. I don’t know why we bother pretending otherwise.”

Now he didn’t know what she was thinking; her eyes had widened, and she was staring at him like he’d gone insane.

“Do you want to—” he lifted one hand in a shrug, deciding he might as well be honest. “I mean, you probably don’t want to stay, but if you did, I could—walk you through the boards, or whatever. And the company’s buying dinner, so that’s, you know, taken care of. Nice perk for us.”

After a second, she gestured toward his side of the booth, like he should sit down already, so he did.

“Are you going to order a drink?”

He blinked. Maybe this was her way of saying it was all right, and that she’d stay anyway. “Uh. Well, I could, I guess. I’ll tell you, I don’t really drink that much.”

She looked skeptical. “No?”

“I’m serious. You can ask Stan. I barely touch the stuff.”

One corner of her mouth lifted in a smile. “Which one is Stan?”

“Oh.” Maybe she forgot. He mimed a kind of flexing thing with his arms. “You know, big artwork, bigger beard?”

She smiled wider this time. He was surprised he could make her do that. “Yes, I remember the beard.”

“Can you read anything on this menu?” he asked after a minute of squinting at all the French names. “I don’t know why Pete picked this place. He never eats anything but hamburgers and ribeyes.”

She was smiling again, like she was tickled, and trying not to laugh. “Try the ratatouille. It’s vegetable stew.”

**

After a few minutes of awkward conversation—where did you go to college? _nowhere_ , are you married? _nope,_ so do you have kids or something? _yes, a boy and a girl_ —they abandoned polite small talk. It was such a fucking relief.

“I think it’s nice to grow up in the city,” Rachel was telling him. They’d started talking about New York, what they liked, didn’t like, whatever. “The sounds of the carriages at night, and all the people. The lights. I’m sure you understand.”

“Well, I’m not—I mean—I’m—“ he swallowed, “you know, naturalized or whatever. My father and I moved here when I was a kid.”

Her eyebrows went up. “Where are you from?”

Ginsberg felt his mouth go a little dry, and just kind of tilted his head to one side, gesturing with his eyebrows like that would show her the scope of the ocean and the countries beyond it. “Uh. Over—over there. We didn’t get here until I was, uh, about six.”

She almost seemed to understand what he was talking about, her mouth thinning into a small line before it evened out. But she didn’t say anything about it other than to clear her throat. “And your mother?”

He let out a sigh, deciding to be honest. “She—uh, died. I never knew her.”

Rachel was quiet for a long time before she spoke again. “I never knew my mother, either.”

“Sometimes I wonder what I missed,” he admitted, then quickly looked away from her before she could see his face. Maybe that wasn’t fair to Morris. He’d done a lot. He’d always tried real hard.

“I always wonder,” she told him quietly. “Even now. Especially now.”

“I bet you’re probably a good mother.” He was thinking of a slyer Donna Reed, the kind of woman who could teach kids how to dress and behave. “I mean—you’re smart, and you’ve got a business, and you—well, you could—your girl will know how to act once she gets to school, or whatever.”

Oh, Jesus. He snapped his mouth closed.

She was staring at him. “You don’t censor yourself, do you?”

He sighed.

“Yeah, I know. It’s annoying. I don’t know how to—be anything else.”

She set her drink aside, waving one hand as if he’d already jumped to the wrong conclusion. “I’ll be frank: I find it refreshing.”

**

By the time their meals came, the money Caroline sent had been delivered, too, and Ginsberg was feeling a hell of a lot better. He’d even drunk most of the glass of beer Rachel had ordered him. Maybe this was what a buzz felt like. His hands were kind of tingly and he felt really relaxed.

“God, I’m just relieved you didn’t leave me here alone,” he told her, stabbing at a piece of tomato with his fork. This stew thing wasn’t half-bad. “I wouldn’t have known what the hell to do.”

She looked like she wanted to smile, but she just tapped her cigarette on the side of the ashtray. “I don’t believe in countering rudeness with rudeness.”

“Well, you can’t, in retail,” Ginsberg said with a shrug. “That’d be a shitty way to keep a business going.”

“Tell that to your advertising colleagues.” She took a sip of her wine, like she was daring him to say boo to that comment.

He actually laughed. She had their number, all right.

**

“Do you ever get jealous of other people—normal people, I mean?” he asked, taking a drink from his beer. He’d gotten another one. Caroline could yell at him later. “Sometimes I think I am, but I can’t tell in this business anymore. If the rat race thing is all in my head, or what.”

“Mr. Ginsberg, I grew up hiding under clothes racks.” She placed her fork and spoon down onto her plate, side by side like they were lying together in the drawer. He didn’t know what that meant. Was that some kind of table manners thing he never learned? Like knowing what fork to use? “And learning the annual yield of mutual funds.”

It was weird that she used his last name, like he was an actual adult. It sounded so formal. “So is that a no?”

“I used to be jealous of my sister,” she answered, leaning back in her booth. “Does that answer your question?”

“Why? No way she’s prettier than you,” Ginsberg said first, and then bit the side of his mouth on accident when he realized what he’d said.

She let the comment slide, thank god, lighting a cigarette with a match she ripped out from one of the restaurant books. Once she’d got the white cylinder lit, she dropped the match into her plate, where it sizzled and snuffed next to a piece of white lettuce.

“Barbara was thirteen when our mother died. Having me.”

“So she really knew her well?”

Rachel nodded, tapping her cigarette against the glass ashtray. “I heard stories, of course, but those aren’t the same.”

“I wish I had stories,” he said gruffly.

She looked surprised. “Your father won’t tell you?”

He shook his head. “Not exactly. Um. So they weren’t—she wasn’t his wife, or anything.” He didn’t mention that he’d seen pictures of Morris’s wife in his old man’s suitcase—a single photo, a woman and little girl, sitting at a table with a little piece of frosted cake. “Um. I was actually adopted by—my old man got me over there,” he said again, using the phrase he’d coined before. “I was born inside the, uh—one of the concentration camps. That’s what they said, anyway. I know how it sounds. Anyway, so he’s not my real father. Technically.”

Rachel was watching him carefully, but there was no pity in her eyes.

“Do you know which one?” She stubbed out her cigarette.

No one had ever asked him that out loud. He didn’t even think he’d asked his father—if Morris knew which camp it was, or if the orphanage even knew. But suddenly it seemed like a real obvious question. Don’t they put place of birth on a birth certificate? The old man had one from the orphanage that they’d drawn up, all official. It was in Swedish. What the hell had it said?

“No. Uh. I haven’t really thought about it. I mean, not like—okay, I do think about it sometimes, or whatever—but you’re not supposed to dwell on that shit. People think it’s creepy.”

He didn’t have to tell her that he did think about it, obviously. You had to know. You couldn’t help it. And he never would, and so he thought about that, too, until it all blurred together in his mind.

“ _God, full of mercy_ ,” Rachel whispered in Hebrew, the first line of a newer Shoah prayer, and his eyes snapped to hers. His tongue was heavy in his mouth. He didn’t know why he’d brought it up. She didn’t want to hear about this.

“Did you lose anyone? I know your—the family was probably here.”

Ginsberg had never met another person who would talk about it, other than to say an extra _Kaddish_ or shake their heads and wipe their eyes with that shattered, distant look. He knew better than to talk about it to Morris.

She fiddled with a knife with one finger; the first time he’d seen her look really uncomfortable all evening. “No.”

Fuck. Why’d he say that? “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t—we can talk about something else, if you want.”

She looked at him like he was nuts, and her voice went a little cold. “Why? Is this keeping you from your sales pitch?”

“No—it’s just, I never—forget it. I don’t know why I said anything.”

It took her a couple of seconds to respond, but when she finally did, he noticed she was carefully folding her dirty napkin next to her salad plate.

“In the spirit of being honest, I was nervous about tonight. I’m sorry if it’s obvious.”

“Over an ad dinner?” he asked blankly, not understanding. “Are you serious?”

“Yes,” she said calmly.

Ginsberg was thrown for a loop, his brow knitting down. “Why?”

She didn’t answer right away; pursing her lips like admitting this out loud was a big deal. “Haven’t you ever been curious about people from your past?”

“What, like, old friends, or whatever?” Something dawned on him. “Is this why you and Roger don’t get along?”

For a second, her mouth twisted like she wanted to laugh, but she didn’t, just smiled at him in a kind of sad way. “Not exactly.”

“Shit.” His voice cracked over the word, and he had to clear his throat. He shouldn’t have asked her that. “Sorry.”

“Don’t.” Her blue eyes were still focused on his face. He couldn’t look away. “Sometimes, I think we’re all sailing through our lives, desperately hoping either no one sees us, or everyone sees us.” She blew out a breath, the same half smile coming to her lips. “Poor motherless things.”

He didn’t know why this made his stomach jump, or why, whenever she looked at him, it was like she was staring straight into his brain.

“I see you,” he said quickly, before he lost the nerve.

Her eyes widened a little, like she didn’t know what to say to that. He felt this weird kind of warmth settle in his chest, and had to look away after a second, tugging at the sleeve of his jacket.

**

In the end, he’d at least gotten to pay for the meal, but once they’d gotten their coats, before they left the restaurant, she gathered her dark fur around her body with one arm, looked over at him with this sideways glance he couldn’t parse, and motioned toward the posterboard he was still carrying under one arm.

“Aren’t you going to give your presentation?”

“Oh, uh—” he’d almost dropped the board, trying to bring it around and show the mockup to her, but she shook her head no.

“I didn’t mean here.”

Twenty minutes later they were checking into the Pierre. He tried to pay for that, too, but she just laughed him off, signing the receipt with an easy confidence he couldn’t even begin to understand. She’d put her name to a huge amount of money without a second’s thought, all for twenty minutes with a terrible ad.

When they got up to the room, she seemed determined to make herself comfortable, hanging up her coat on the rack, turning on the lamp, and then taking a seat on the nearby sofa, watching him fumble the board as he tried to set it up on one of the end tables.

“You should take off your jacket,” she told him, tilting her head toward the coat rack as if saying the words would make it happen.

“Oh,” Ginsberg guessed she could see how uncomfortable he was, trying to get everything set up and sweating and feeling nervous. “Well, yeah. I guess I could.” A nervous laugh escaped him as he took his overcoat off and set it on top of the nearest armchair, followed by his suit jacket. He felt awkward standing here in a long-sleeve shirt, especially when it was so dingy, but she didn’t seem to mind.

Another smile was tugging at her mouth, something that started small and grew big, crept over her face like a secret.

“What?” He looked down, alarmed. “I got something on me?”

“No. But those,” she said gently, jutting her chin toward his dress pants, “are at least two sizes too big for you.”

Jesus. Was that all she meant? He relaxed a little. Department store mavens—she was probably always doing this to people: telling them what they should wear, picking out their sizes, that kind of thing. It was probably good business.

“You’re like one of those gals from the movies,” he told her with a snort. “I’m not spending good money on expensive clothes.”

“Is that what your tailor says?” she teased.

“Come on. Look at me,” he said flatly. “You think I got a tailor?”

She raised an eyebrow. “Would you settle for an amateur’s opinion?”

Maybe it was the drinks, maybe it was because he actually liked talking to her, but Ginsberg decided he didn’t care if she saw him up close, gave him some fashion advice. “Sure, what the hell.”

He watched as she stood up, shed her dark green suit jacket in an effortless motion, and let it dangle from one hand as she walked towards him, slowly.

“You’ll probably just tell me to get ‘em hemmed,” he said nervously, running a hand over his jaw as she draped her jacket on the ground in front of him. “Sew up the back pockets. Matching buttons. All that department store crap.”

Ginsberg wasn’t really sure why she’d just put her nice jacket on the floor until she knelt down in front of him.

“Oh. Nice—nice trick.”

His voice sounded a little hoarse, even to his own ears. He was starting to feel kinda weird about this. With everything they’d talked about, how comfortable they’d gotten in the restaurant, it was just starting to hit him that she was a client, and a woman—and really fucking beautiful—oh, god, don’t think that. Don’t think any of those things while she’s down there.

“You’re quiet.” Nimble fingers were rolling up his cuffs with quick, practiced motions. “These should be hemmed by at least two inches.”

“Yeah—I don’t,” Ginsberg sputtered, trying not to hiss out a breath as her polished nails suddenly grazed his ankle. “Mrs. Katz, I don’t think—”

She glanced up at him, one hand poised on the inside of his calf, and for the first time he saw how dark her eyes were, how closely she was watching him. Her mouth twitched up like she had just told a little joke.

“Michael. All you have to do is say the word, and I’ll stop.”

Her hand was moving higher. Ginsberg felt like he couldn’t breathe. Oh, god, she was actually—he felt his cock twitch as it lengthened and filled, straining against his zipper. She couldn’t really be—what was happening?

“What—” he huffed out an audible noise when her palms skated over the backs of his knee, “—word?”

“ _Peace_ ,” she breathed, and it took him a minute to realize she’d said it in Yiddish. All he could think about was how hot her hands were, skating up the back of his thighs, and the way his cock kept shifting against the front seam of his pants—needing—oh, Jesus.

“ _Michael. Did you hear me?_ ”

“ _Yes,_ ” he hissed back in the same language. “Yeah, but don’t—I, um—”

She smiled now, and switched back to English. “Has anyone ever done this to you?” She kept staring up at him like he had better give her the answer, her expression serene, but her eyes knowing.

He choked out a noise like a laugh. “Are you kidding?”

“Yes or no. Tell me,” Rachel said again, calmly, and her hand traced up Ginsberg’s inner thigh, making him gasp.

“N—never.”

“Good.” She leaned forward, opening her mouth and suckling the head of his cock through the fabric of his pants. Shocked, he jerked his hips up with a grunt, and after a minute, when she pulled away, tracing over the wet spot with one finger—the other hand stroking slow circles across the cleft of his hip—he rocked forward again, shivering at the sensation.

“Undo your belt,” she told him. This time there was no hesitation; his fingers shook, but they flew to his buckle, and after a couple seconds of fumbling he had it undone and clanking open.

“Wait,” he couldn’t help saying as she unzipped him, the words tumbling from parched lips, “oh, god, _Rachel_ —”

They shouldn’t be doing this, but he couldn’t make himself say that word. He didn’t want her to stop.

She got her hand on him through his underwear, stroking up the underside of his cock with one thumb, and this time he moaned so loud he was sure half the hotel heard it. “ _Jesus!_ ”

His hands were on her shoulders—shaking, shaking—just like his legs, how the hell was he standing here with his pants open and a woman kneeling in front of him doing—doing—oh, god—

She licked him in one long stripe through his underwear, from root to tip, and he thought he was gonna pass out, it felt so good. He felt precome beading up already—oh, no, not yet—

“You’re all right,” she was telling him. She had his underwear almost off, now, and one hand wrapped around the tip of him, gently squeezing just below his crown. He didn’t know how the hell that had happened, but he just wanted her to move, to flex her hand nice and tight and just stroke—

“I wanna,” he rasped out, eyes fluttering closed, “oh, Rachel, please just—”

“Do you want me to lick you again?”

Her voice was green velvet—lush and heavy and so, so fucking soft—

“Michael. Use your words.”

“Yeah.” Ginsberg kept his eyes closed. He couldn’t even look at her right now or it would set him off. “Hell yeah. Fuck yeah.”

She didn’t pull her hand away, but he felt her grip loosen, just slightly, just enough for him to feel a heady rush before her mouth enveloped him and her tongue swirled over his crown. Down, down, down, oh, god, hot and wet and tight and—

The tip of his cock hit the back of her throat, and his knees almost buckled. His fingers tightened in her hair—he was making these pathetic groaning noises, so loud, too loud, but he couldn’t stop, oh, shit, he couldn’t stop, she held him there for what felt like an eternity—for barely a second—

And then she fucking _laughed. He felt it._

The vibrations went all through him, made him twitch in her mouth, and his hips canted forward, once, desperate. “Shit!”

She made a little choking sound, and he felt terrible, eyes flying open to make sure she was okay, but when she pulled all the way off, her eyes were sparkling in the dim light. When did the lamp turn off? Her mouth was red and wet and her bright lipstick was smeared over her mouth and her pointed chin and down the sides of his cock.

It was the hottest fucking thing he’d ever seen.

“Keep talking,” she commanded, and there was no mistaking the tone of her voice—it was a goddamn command, she meant for him to fucking do it.

“Okay,” he breathed, staring down at her, watching as she nipped her way back up his cock and feeling his eyes flutter closed. He couldn’t keep them open. Fuck, her lips felt— _fuck,_ so good—she swirled her tongue over his head again and he thrust up into her mouth, but this time she didn’t choke, just moaned low in her throat.

Oh, god, he might come just from hearing that!

She sucked him again, with the same little moan, making obscene wet noises around his cock every time she took him further down, and he was panting now, he could feel it building—oh, god, don’t stop—but if she didn’t stop he’d—

“’M gonna—” he could hardly speak, his voice was raw, he was shaking like a leaf just trying to keep himself standing, “ah— _ah_ —”

Her fingers dug into his bare ass and her lips tightened around the middle of his cock, tongue skating underneath, and he felt himself spurt, shuddering, grabbing her by the hair as she sucked him dry. God, she felt so good.

He ended up on his back on the carpet, twitching and trembling, and she was petting him through it—his cock slick and tender against her hand, his entire body tensing and relaxing in spasms until he finally felt like he could suck in a breath.

“What the _fuck_ ,” he finally managed to say, staring up at her with his hands pressed into the carpet, almost laughing because this was fucking crazy—just absurd.

“How was it?” she asked, wiping her mouth and raising a knowing eyebrow.

He did laugh, that time, putting his hands over his face with a whine.

She caught them with her own, tugging them up and pinning his arms back up above his head, straddling one of his thighs.

Ginsberg felt himself flush hot and cold. It hit him like a ton of bricks, then—the way she’d slotted his leg between hers, the way she was moving her hips—she must not have—she needed—

“I’ll touch you,” he blurted out. “Just—just tell me.”

He didn’t know where to start. He wanted to touch her everywhere.

Rachel didn’t speak, but he knew she wanted him to do it, because she reached behind her head and unzipped her dress, slowly, watching him watch her, the way a hawk might eye another bird in those nature documentaries Morris liked. When she pulled it over her head with his help to reveal blood-red lingerie – silk and satin like he’d never seen up close – something broke in his brain.

“You didn’t wear that for me,” he said stupidly.

“No,” she answered, and he couldn’t tell if it was _no-i-did_ or _no-you’re-right_.

He thought maybe – but he couldn’t really think, not with her dress off and her nipples visible against soft silk – not with the way she was slowly grinding down against his leg, back and forth in a way that put fog in his brain.

“You put this on with—with him?”

Don. He meant to say for Don, but he couldn’t make his mouth work right. It had come to him in the cab, and made sense in a way that this didn’t – why would a woman like her bother with someone like Ginsberg, when she could be with—why would she want to—?

“Michael.”

She took his hand, jolting him out of his train of thought, and guided it down her bare stomach until it rested just below the lace trim of her panties. There was soft hair there, waiting underneath the thin fabric, and he felt his heart speed up in anticipation, brain clouding up at the thought of her.

“Make me feel you,” she told him. Her palm was poised over the back of his hand, and instinctively, he pressed down with his index and middle fingers, curious, feeling a tiny nub there, just under his hands. She let out a breath.

He did it again, stunned. Fuck. He wanted to get her going for real, and trailed his fingers across that same spot using a little more pressure, tentatively putting his other hand to her breast. Rough calluses caught against the silk as he rubbed it with the heel of his hand. Was that what he was supposed to do? If it wasn’t, she didn’t seem to mind, just opened her mouth a little, like it was good.

“Like that,” she sighed. Her hips rolled forward again.

Ginsberg nodded, wordless, and shifted her in his lap so he could reach her a little better, so she was bent over his chest instead of sitting up straight. He pulled her down to him and kissed her hard this time, and after a minute she made a soft noise, deepened the kiss, and slid her tongue into his mouth.

God, that made him crazy. They kept kissing like that until she pulled away, panting, and reached back to fumble with the clasp of her bra.

“Use your teeth on me,” she told him as she tossed it aside, moving up to straddle him in earnest.

“My—”

“ _Michael._ ” It was a plea. “Now.”

He leaned forward, opened his mouth, and carefully grazed her nipple with his lips, teeth barely scraping over reddened flesh. She shuddered at the contact, a little moan escaping her, and suddenly he realized that her satin panties were sticking to his thigh, she was so excited.

It was making him hard, feeling her this slick against him, and knowing that he’d done it to her, that she was going to—he was going to make her fall apart.

He bit her again, a little harder this time, and she cried out, rubbing herself against his leg with a desperate movement. He started kissing her there, too, holding onto her waist with one hand and cradling her close, slotting his leg faster between her thighs, trying to get her there, but after a minute or so, he could tell something had changed.

The rhythm was off, or something—he didn’t know what had happened, but whatever it was had stopped her. She quit moving, and shuddered a little in his embrace, swaying forward with a little whining noise. Her forehead rested against his shoulder.

“What is it?” he asked, one hand moving to palm her back. “Can I—let me try something else. Let me help.”

“I—” her voice was high-pitched, quiet, “god—”

“Okay. I can—what do you want me to—?”

She sat up onto her knees, shimmying out of her panties, and when he saw her naked he was pretty sure he forgot how to speak. Her voice gained confidence when she saw the look on his face, and he felt her hand stroking him again, guiding him toward her. “Here. Like this.”

When she got the tip of him inside her, his eyes slid closed again, and when he got halfway in, he started sucking wind, gripping her hips with desperate fingers. “Hnnng. Oh, my god, stop. Wait. I—”

She paused, although he could feel her clench around him, and had to count in his head to keep himself in line. Don’t come yet. Not yet.

“Open your eyes,” she murmured, and that’s when he realized he’d been saying it out loud.

Ginsberg wrenched them open, and immediately focused on his hands, trying to keep it together, trying to force his stupid body to stay calm. Under his palms, the soft skin of Rachel’s hips was mapped with faint, jagged, whitish scars. He traced the line of one of them with a curious finger. What were they from? How could you hurt yourself there?

“My children,” she told him with a huff of breath, and she was moving down him again, slowly, until he was buried to the hilt inside her and all he felt was heat and pressure and—

He was making a high-pitched whining noise, watching her on top of him, her moving up and down and fucking herself slowly at first, then faster and faster, breathy gasps turning into little moans _—_ breasts bouncing and hair falling into her face and their hips moving together and her pupils blown wide—

“ _Come on, Michael,_ ” she was murmuring to him in two different languages, “ _come on. Come on. Let me show you._ ”

She was breathless, and made a sudden yelping noise— _fuck_ —his whole body shook and shook as he gave it up, moving moving moving not thinking until he felt her slumping forward into his chest.

Ginsberg didn’t know how long it lasted for either of them, or when he got his breath back, but when he did the only thing he wanted was to see her like that again. His limbs were rubbery and slow to react, but he still rolled them both over with a grunt, causing her to clutch at his back, stare up at him with huge, lust-drugged eyes.

“What are you—?”

He bent his head and nipped at her neck, then moved down to suckle her until she was flushed red from her chest up, almost feverish-looking.

“ _Oh_ ,” she breathed, but he didn’t stop for long, just kept moving down her body, kissing her everywhere until soft short hair tickled over his mouth and jaw. When he leaned down and licked her; searching for the little spot he’d felt under his fingers before, she actually shrieked, and her hips jerked up toward his face.

She was grabbing him by the hair now, tense again, and he just kept going—figuring he was doing something right if she was making this kind of noise—just experimenting, licking into her and sucking and mouthing at that little spot and trying to figure out what to do with his hands. She just kept urging him on, stroking his hair and ears, and whenever he’d do something good she’d _moan_ , real low in her throat, like he was killing her.

Jesus. He was half-hard again. He could smell her all over, and the taste of her was intoxicating. She was getting close, too, Ginsberg could tell when it built up, this time—she was shaking all over, panting, shuddering, pawing at the back of his head and his neck and the sides of his face— _Michael, yes, Michael, yes, Michael—y—_

When she came it was with a noise like a sob, and she accidentally yanked his hair. For about thirty seconds, touching her through it, seeing her quiver and relax and shiver under him, he felt like the greatest guy in the world.

Until a big sniff and another sob made him look up and see that was crying.

Oh, my god. “Are—are you okay?”

She was nodding her head yes, but little tears were still prickling up at the corners of her eyes, sliding down her cheeks, and she was covering her mouth with one hand and making a tiny whining noise, like if she let any of this out for real, she was never gonna stop.

“Hey.” He kept talking, stroking his hands up her arms and down her sides, trying to figure out what the hell had happened. “Sweetheart—Rachel—oh, god, honey, what’s the matter? What’s wrong?”

Did this normally happen to women, afterward? Was she upset? Was it something he did? Was it because he _didn’t_ do something?

“Hey,” he kept babbling to her, hoping it was helping, “hey, it’s all right.”

After a minute, she pulled her hand away from her face, not looking at him, just staring off toward the far wall where the nice dresser held a colorful lamp and a tall vase of fake flowers. Her hair was all mussed and her nose and eyes were red and her mouth was trembling. He wanted to kiss her puffed up lower lip, maybe get her to smile again.

Before he could do it, or say anything else, she was bracing her hands on his chest as if she wanted to sit up. He crawled backwards on all fours, still feeling like he needed to touch her, but he wasn’t sure if she would let him, all of a sudden. He still didn’t know why she was crying; he wished she’d tell him what had happened.

“Rachel, we can—”

“I have to go home,” she interrupted, very quiet.

His face fell, and the worst part was, he couldn’t even hide that he was upset. She looked straight at him. She saw his horrified expression, and then she looked away, which was worse than not being seen at all. He felt like there was no air in his lungs, like someone had socked him in the stomach.

“Shit,” was all he said.

When he got home almost an hour later—he hadn’t even wanted to walk around the city, he was too tired—Morris was up and standing in the kitchen with a glass of water. He gave Ginsberg kind of a weird look as he passed by the doorway.

“Early for you, hm?”

“Oh.” Ginsberg was trying not to blush. Could the old man tell what he’d been doing? Did he look different? Or funny? “No, it’s just—the dinner was—whatever. I’m exhausted, all right? I’m going to bed.”

He didn’t even wash his face before lying down, just stripped off his jacket and pants and fell into the mattress. He didn’t even dream.

**

“Michael!”

Staring into space, Ginsberg jerked his head up to stare at Joan, who was sitting down at the opposite end of the conference table, eyes narrowed at him like he’d done something really stupid. They hadn’t started the status meeting yet, but she looked like she was already fed up.

“Caroline gave you a receipt for the other night,” she said, very slowly, which gave him chills. How the hell did she know about that? “Do you have it?”

“Oh.” He shoved one hand into his jacket pocket for the rest of the money and the receipt, pulling out a few crumpled bills and some change, pushing it all toward the other end of the table. “Uh, yeah, I got it here somewhere.”

“Wait. Did you meet with Menken’s by yourself?” Peggy looked horrified.

“Shut up!” was his first response, but he bit his tongue to keep from blurting out anything stupid. “I—it was fine. It went fine.”

“You could have—you’re not supposed to—”

“Hey, it’s not my fault that—”

“Ginzo,” Stan interrupted with a sigh, bent over a greeting card with a sharpie in hand. Meaning he should shut his face. “I’m drawing a tiny appendix in Pete’s card. Don’t ruin my concentration.”

“You’re an idiot.” Peggy smacked Stan’s arm.

Joan just looked like she wanted to murder them all, but didn’t say anything else, and started straightening out the crumpled bills into a neat pile, setting them next to her folio of papers.

From the hallway, there was a knock on the door—Clara walked in, carrying a giant brown-paper-wrapped box in two arms.

“Um. Sorry to interrupt, but—Ginsberg, this just came for you. From Menken’s.”

“ _What_ ,” said Stan, accidentally drawing a stray line off the paper, he glanced up so fast. Ginsberg had already jumped out of his seat, snatching the box from Clara’s hands.

“No, I got it. Uh. Thanks.”

He wrestled it into their office and got the door mostly shut before ripping off the paper and opening the top of the box. Under cream-colored tissue paper was a brand new suit – sandy brown pants and a nice jacket and a white collared shirt so crisp Ginsberg wondered if it had been made in the last couple of days. Jesus. He’d never had anything like this in his life. Why’d she do this for him? Was it because she felt bad? Or she missed him? Or she wanted him to—

 _Fuck._ He forced himself to try and ignore that thought, although it didn’t work so well.

_Wanted him to screw her again?_

Rooting around the box, Ginsberg found a small card taped to the inside of the cardboard lid. It wasn’t much on the outside, just a little square of plain company stationery. And on the inside was a scribble of handwriting, in glossy ink, barely more than a signature. _Nice seeing you._ _Rachel Katz._ He picked up another little packet inside, which turned out to have two silver and black buttons inside it. Or, no, not buttons. Cufflinks. Shit. How much did this cost?

“Jesus.” Standing in the half-open doorway, Stan was frowning at Ginsberg, concern written all over his face. Ginsberg felt his heart speed up, letting the silver things fall back into the open box. Oh, god. Did he know? Did he figure it out?

Ginsberg was trying not to blush, and couldn’t look at Stan. “Yeah. Uh. I don’t know why she—we talked about suits, at one point, but I didn’t—she—”

He bit off the end of that sentence.

Stan’s expression was unreadable, but he let the subject drop, thank god. “Well, we’re starting, so you’d better get in here.”

Ginsberg squashed the lid on top of the whole package, feeling sick to his stomach because he was so nervous. “Fine. I’ll be right in.”

Once Stan had left, Ginsberg snuck his hand into the box again, picked up that stupid fucking card, and slipped it into his pants pocket. He could feel it burning a hole into the lining; like everyone who looked at him would know what had happened. Would know that he had done it with her and that she was sad and that he was—god, he didn’t know what he was.

 _Nice seeing you._ He forced himself not to reach down into his pocket—to feel that coarse little piece of paper under his fingertips. _Nice seeing you._

**Author's Note:**

> I cannot _believe_ I have written yet another crackship for this show! Somebody save me from myself before I write another thirty pages... :)


End file.
